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GPL Infringement Lawsuits Target Two More Companies

The Software Freedom Law Center has filed two more GPL infringement lawsuits on behalf of an open-source software project. The second-ever GPL lawsuit alleges that Xterasys and High-Gan Antennas failed to honor "source-code transparency," in violation of Busyboxs GPLv2 license.

The suits are the second and third ever filed in the United States over the GNU GPL (General Public License), widely acknowledged to be the worlds most popular open-source software license. After the first-ever GPL lawsuit was filed last month, defendant Monsoon Multimedia quickly announced it would settle out of court. In its Oct. 30 settlement Monsoon agreed to remedy its violation, ensure future compliance and financially compensate the plaintiffs.

As with the first GPL suit, the new cases were filed by the Software Freedom Law Center on behalf of the open-source software project that maintains Busybox. Filed Nov. 19 in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, the complaints request injunctions be issued against Xterasys and High-Gain Antennas and that damages and litigation costs be awarded.

Specifically, the suit claims that the SFLC asked Xterasys and High-Gain Antennas to distribute BusyBox source code to downstream recipients, but that they have not complied. Refusing to honor "source-code transparency" is a violation of the BusyBoxs GPL Version 2 license.